Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Things (film)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Malcolmxl5 (talk) 00:28, 19 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Things (film)

[Hide this box] New to Articles for deletion (AfD)? Read these primers!

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Article, created by somebody with a direct personal conflict of interest, about a film whose claims of notability per WP:NFILM are not properly referenced. By far the majority of the references here are unreliable sources, such as Amazon.com and unreliable blogs and podcasts and its own self-published website about itself -- and of the two genuinely strong sources (Variety and Dread Central) where I was actually able to verify anything at all about what they said, I can confirm that Variety was definitively a falsified source: when I tried to Wayback it, it actually led me to a review (dated 1935!) of a completely unrelated film called Things to Come, not to any content that had anything whatsoever to do with this film. And as for the Harris M. Lentz book, it's being used only to footnote that the film exists, rather than any content about the film, so it's very unclear whether it contains any substantive content at all -- and both the faked Variety review and the self-promotional sockpuppetry that infested the Barry J. Gillis AFD last week leave me very not inclined to give it the benefit of the doubt. At best, this is a candidate for the blow it up and start over treatment, if somebody can actually find better sources and write a new, WP:COI-free version -- but at worst, a self-aggrandizing filmmaker tried to abuse Wikipedia to make his work seem more notable than it really is by reference bombing it with bad sources in an attempt to hide its lack of good ones, and articles like that have to go away. Bearcat (talk) 21:43, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Film-related deletion discussions. Bearcat (talk) 21:43, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Canada-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU^(T) 22:30, 11 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Despite COI and sockpuppet issues, I don't see any issues with WP:GNG. I hate giving socks any ground but this article isn't much of a puff piece, the largest section goes into great detail about how awful most people thought the movie was. WP:TNT not needed. I'll note that although it was a decade ago at this point, there was a previous bundle AfD which decided Things was notable but Gillis wasn't. I don't think that has changed over the years.LM2000 (talk) 06:33, 12 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Considering that most of the sources here are trash, I'm not seeing how GNG has been satisfied at all. Bearcat (talk) 15:32, 12 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Per the nom. This whole article needs WP:TNT and can come back if someone finds actually significant and reliable sources for it. It's a complete mess on every level at the moment. The COI issue also means this article should be vigorously uprooted so as not to reward corruption on Wikipedia. Newshunter12 (talk) 05:29, 18 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete: Per Nom. Sorry but I cannot give socks or COI editing any ground. I don't know the reliability of Huffpost but the implications that a COI editor has a close relation to the subject means a possible financial gain so by proxy is COI/paid editing. This automatically calls into question any neutrality as provided by the "Five pillars". Otr500 (talk) 09:04, 18 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Delete - COI issues aside, the poor sourcing on this does not allow the article to pass the WP:GNG. As stated, the vast majority of sources on this are not from reliable sources, and the few that do come from reliable sources are not substantial enough to establish notability. The book by Harris Lentz, for example, is nothing more than a listing of the film's year of release and cast. As the nom stated, the article was just reference bombed to make it appear that it received far more coverage from legitimate sources than it actually did, and when you strip that all away, what remains is not enough to establish notability. Rorshacma (talk) 21:49, 18 June 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.